DISQUS

Huh. Austin isn't even in the list's top ten. And DC beat SF, hmm... Stats are a great way to attract attention, but they don't account for what makes our community what it is even if they are skewed.

Thanks for the write-up. People may also want to check out the post-presentation interviews and photos taken by others that are now up at SocialMatchbox.com. Mingle360 sent out emails to everyone who who turned in their MingeSticks yesterday so check your inbox for details there.

Great photo of a great all around guy.

Just noticed that there wasn't a link to the Social Matchbox website, it is: http://www.socialmatchbox.com

Past presentations, photos, etc. can be found there.

Steve,

We've posted videos from some recent presentations here:
http://www.socialmatchbox.com

More to come asap.

Bob

Supposing you have 10 or 10,000, would it make a difference if you could move them to an end? It all depends on your goal. Clients might be impressed by numbers, but if you can't leverage those numbers what is the point? But the numbers might be helpful in staying on top of the latest trends if you have mechanism for filtering all of that stimulation.

Bob
http://www.jobmatchbox.com

Let's hope they share RSVP data back with Eventbrite and others, having yet another disconnected RSVP system is going to make it harder on event organizers when they can't get accurate head counts of who is going to show up.

Bob
Jobmatchbox.com

The upside of the current economic situation is that mergers, acquisitions and end points are on the way for many of these organizations. With these happenings there will be synchronizations of things like FriendFeed and Plaxo Pulse. As things shift more toward mobile and ultra-mobile devices users are not going to be tolerant of so much redundancy, so that will probably effect a bit of a shift toward consolidation of these types of services.

Bob
Jobmatchbox.com

Two great backpacks, built with quick and easy pockets on the sides and main panel, and well placed compartments in all compartments.

http://www.timbuk2.com/tb2/products/backpacks/u...
http://www.altrec.com/keen/morrison-daypack

I'm considering a switch to Comcast after three weeks with no Verizon service. Before you consider pulling the plug be sure to consider the alternative. It took me three weeks and 12-14 conversations (not counting the 3 field techs who came out to "fix" things) to get service restored. I was told everything from "No one from Verizon can ever guarantee that your service will be restored" to "the only solution to your problem is to cut your bandwidth in half". When they cut my bandwidth in half I still had problems, but I discovered a clause in my contract that said that if they materially changed my service without my permission as a last resort then I could break my contract and have no further obligations. So I did. Fortunately, I had a backup service. At one point during my whole ordeal that went down too (also Verizon). The last tech who came to my house told me that Verizon has cut their DSL support staff down to the bone.

Nick,

A widget isn't any different from a Facebook application, what is different is how the code hooks into the base platform. For a widget to hook into Facebook it hooks into Facebook's open platform using FBML and FQL, but from that point on it is just like a widget in a widget bank on iGoogle or Freewebs. I don't think that just because you have an extra layer of code that you are hooking into it deserves a different name. Similarly, if you insert a widget into your blog (like the MyBlogLog widget) it has to hook into the code that your blog is written in which is why most widgets have adaptations for different base publishing platforms like WordPress, TypePad, Blogger, etc.

Bob
Jobmatchbox.com

Nick,

It boils down to trust. Facebook has asked users to suspend their privacy concerns and trust them, but that Facebook has violated their trust. To get it back they are going to have to take measures to protect user privacy. They still have the weakest user privacy and security controls of ANY of the major players - MySpace, Google, Yahoo and Microsoft.

Bob
Jobmatchbox.com

I missed the whole part about HOW they protect privacy. Just because they say that take privacy seriously doesn't make it so. Their privacy and security policy are still the weaker than all of their major competitors. While MySpace, Google, Yahoo and Microsoft all put specifics into their privacy and security policies about protecting users from employees and so on, Facebook leaves this out. This isn't by accident.

It is nice to see that someone outside of the DC startup weekend group noticed what we were working on as far as holaneighbor! is concerned. I just wanted to point out that the value proposition loged on the wiki that you link to above went out with the guy who suggested the idea (he left after the first couple of hours on the first night and never returned). The concept that we built the site around wasn't so much a "social network" as it was a "social resource". Many of the competing sites, LifeAt, FatDoor, etc. focused on creating a social network and we decided to focus instead on building something useful to people in our local spaces. The name itself signifies more of a handshake and a conversation than it does a friend finder concept. We didn't want to build something that would just replicate what Facebook, MySpace and other social sites were already doing. We also took a radical departure from LifeAt in the at we decided to keep the concept people centric rather than condo centric. The obvious benefit being that neighbors exist outside of condos. With that in mind we developed a product that attempts to transcend the brick and mortar lines that Life At draws, while leaving room for interaction with social networks.

To Rodney's point - Facebook has a Chief Privacy Officer, but he hasn't done anything to improve their Security and Privacy policies since Nick quoted my story a month ago. Here is the story, it breaks out their privacy and security polciies and compares them to other popular sites like MySpace, Google, Yahoo and Microsoft...you decide:

http://jobmatchbox.com/2007/09/22/why-i-stopped...

Google has much bigger plans. You should read the article that inspired Arrington's post. Here is a write-up about it with links to it and a series of related articles:

http://jobmatchbox.com/2007/09/23/re-thoughts-o...

Nick,

Your point is a valid one. Using the web to simply drive traffic in order to convert people into paying customers is what people are used to. That doesn't mean it is the only way to go or even the best way to go. By building a thriving community on Facebook an organization will ultimately attract new people, energize existing customers and create a buzz machine that lives on. The traditional model of simply driving traffic to achieve a conversion is great, but once you've made that initial conversion you have to start all over again, whereas with a Facebook app or group you have the ability to create a circuit that will keep bringing people back (to both sites).

Jobster has done this quite effectively by creating a social network within a social network effect using their Facebook group and app as an extension of their primary platfrom rather than simply creating a tool that will drive traffic. They even leverage their Facebook app to collect email addresses and data from users that will be used in separate hiring campaigns.

Nick,

I hope the after party at BarCamp DC was fun. The last time we all got together at Cafe Asia good conversations happened and I wish that I could have been there this time too.

Regarding Facebook, Arrington and his guy Nik only have the latest and most obvious problem. I mentioned another vulnerability to Facebook last week and provided more details about it this morning here:

http://jobmatchbox.com/2007/08/12/social-networ...

Bob
Jobmatchbox.com

I'm not sure which is worse: 25+ million people suffering from social withdrawal or the revenue that all of those people who built apps are losing. When MySpace went down back in May they had a better statement:

"We're hoping to have friendship restored to our users as soon as possible."*

*Quoted from the Onion's story titled: "MySpace Outage Leaves Millions Friendless", http://www.theonion.com/content/news/myspace_ou...